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Is it sad or unfortunate that Juan Miguel Hails from a country ruled by a dictator of Castro's ilk? Yes it is. Is it also unfortunate that it is possible that his decisions may well have been influenced by agents of that government. Yes it is. BUT - that isnt the most important issue here. Parenthood is. At the moment that Juan Miguel demanded to regain custody of his son and his relatives in Miami refused his request, AT THAT MOMENT, regardless of how well meaning they thought they may have been, regardless of how much you or I or anyone else may agree with their politics and disagree with Castro's, at that moment, they had committeed a criminal act. Now, if we can agree that the United States goverment has more duty and authority to be involved in ending/solving/punishing crimes committed by its nationals on its soil than in pontificating about the misdeeds of other governments, then it follows that there was some responsibility on the part of some government authority to end the crime beiung committed.

The problem here is actually fairly simple. Elian's Miami relatives, and the scores of Americans who scream about how we betrayed or let Elian down are all blind in the same way - Namely, they cannot understand that taking action with benevolant intent does NOT justify trampling on another's rights of choice/decision. In fact, this attitude lies at the core of many social/political disputes. People decide that a certain behavior pattern is in keeping with their moral code, and then go on to try and justify forcing that behavior pattern and/or moral code unto the rest of society. Point out to the perpetrators that this sort of system is hardly FREEDOM, and the outcry is enormous ..... you will be ridiculed and call all sorts of nasty names (any word starting with the letters L-I-B seems to be the moniker of choice in this particular forum)

So, my point? Simply that the crime was not Juan Miguel's, for being Cuban or for living under a political system different from ours - it was not Castro's , it was not Reno's - it blame rests with those well meaning Miami relatives who could not understand that their good intent could not supercede the rights of parenthood. As for Elian's deceased mother - I here the voices saying "what of her wishes" - and my answer is that the party charged with considering her wishes when carrying out his actions is again Juan Miguel.

Hypothetical: You live in the gulag, pick any gulag. Let's say Afghanistan with the Taliban. Your estranged wife was caught playing music and now they are going to punish her by beating her so she escapes with your son to your relatives in a refugee camp. You are planning to escape too but a neighborhood snoop heard the plan and reported you to the Taliban authorities. Now you're in real trouble! The Taliban clerics don't want this to ever go public and they don't want anyone leaving their gulag. Your only hope is that you get a message to your relatives and to the country officials where your relatives have escaped to. You know that they will help you because they have always condemned the Taliban way of life and they have a history of helping people who escape persecution.

Fast forward: the country officials where your relatives live won't even consider your relatives statements when they say that you planned to escape even though it is backed up by your friends who also escape to the refugee camp and whose relatives back in Afghanistan will suffer for their outspokenness. Then you get an attorney but he's secretly working for the Taliban. You get to visit the news media of that country, but the Taliban puts your parents and your wife's child by a previous marriage in their custody in case you would be crazy enough to refute their lies. Well anyway, if you want to think that the relatives did Juan Miguel wrong, go right ahead. I bet you never read the transcripts posted in the Granma online of the telephone conversations between Juan Miguel and Marisleysis, he was calling her, "my love", to his child's kidnapper? That whole emnity between the relatives was manufactured by the media and the leftists in government. Uncle Delfin had letters and video tapes of his recent visit to Cuba, presented as court evidence and shown on local newstations, that showed him dancing with Juan Miguel's mother and blowing each other kisses even though Juan Miguel's mother was a Communist party card carrying member and proud of it. Most Miami Cubans have some relative/s back in Cuba that are brainwashed by the Communist lie. No big deal. Delfin and Lazaro and Angela still sent them lots of money because they were family and they loved each other. Well, I have to go and anyway this is all moot because Juan Miguel's godfather and uncle Delfin and Juan Miguel's uncle Lazaro only wanted to make sure that Juan Miguel and Elian would be reunited without the gun packing commie goons around so that they could know what his wishes truly were without communist coercion. Of course, Castro and all the American leftists couldn't allow that to happen because then their house of cards would come crashing down, hence the raid.

I think its hard for Americans to understand the terror of living in a country where the dictator and the snoops can literally put you to death on a whim.

Did you know that it was reported in an American (Knight Ridder) newspaper, El Nuevo Herald, that a child in Cuba was beaten by a Cuban government security guard for just saying that Elian was dumb to have returned to Cuba? There was a man in Cuba a month or so ago who was hungry and stole or ate some beef and was going to be sent to prison, he committed suicide rather than go to the tropical gulag. Some navy doctors who worked at Guantanamo around the time of the Mariel exodus reported that it was apparent that the children in Castro's summer school camps were being used as guinea pigs for Castro's meningitis vaccines. Don't believe Dan Rathers, it's still a gulag. Castro's Human Rights Violations Against Children In Cuba